Elementary Schools

A circle of ceramic flowers now hangs above the 23rd Street entrance to Buena Vista Horace Mann, symbolizing the unity of the school’s community. After a year of divisive political rhetoric aimed at immigrants, the teachers and parents at San Francisco’s first public Spanish-English immersion school hoped creating the work of art would send its students a powerful message: They...

Over 500 students and their families are expected to march through the Mission District today to declare their commitment to gaining a college education. The annual March to College will begin at 3 p.m. at Buena Vista Horace Mann K-8 at 3351 23rd St. From there, the march will snake along Mission Street and down 20th Street to John O’Connell High School at 2355...

Police searched Marshall Elementary Tuesday evening, looking for suspects in an earlier incident in which someone threw a gun out of a car window. Although children had been dismissed for the day some staff were on hand, and police cleared all for the search. “I just got kicked out” said Chi Ho Leung, a janitor who had been working at...

A new target for tech disruption: Illiteracy. A product marketer and freelance web developer have started a site that collects recurring donations from Bay Area residents with something to spare, and converts that money into books that go to local schools that need them by providing credit to a subsidized bookseller. Founders A.T. McWilliams and Holman Gao both have a longstanding...

Students, parents and teachers walked out of Buena Vista Horace Mann school Wednesday morning to publicly declare their support for undocumented immigrants, women, and other targets of disparaging remarks made by president-elect Donald Trump. Some 200 people of all ages streamed onto the sidewalk of Valencia Street, carrying signs made by the children with messages of solidarity, chanting “build kindness,...

If a new ballot measure passes in November, San Francisco may become the first city in California to give non-citizens a vote in local school board elections. Proposition N, which would let parents and guardians of students in the San Francisco school district vote for school board members, is critical in a city where immigrants account for 35 percent of the population, say supporters. More...

For the past 25 years, Mission resident Dan Sudran and his small team of instructors at the Mission Science Workshop have provided underserved students with a safe space outside of the classroom to tinker, explore, and wonder about nature, technology, and science. On Thursday, the workshop celebrated its quarter century anniversary by opening the doors to its auto shop-turned-science-lab to...

An estimated 400 students ranging from 3rd to 5th grade, accompanied by some 100 parents and members of the Mission Graduates program, gathered in the schoolyard at Buena Vista Horace Mann Thursday at 3 p.m. to celebrate Mission youth going to college. Other schools joining in the march included Everett, Flynn, Cesar Chavez, James Lick, and several others. Gerber Marquez, a manager...

A private elementary school is eyeing one of the vacant commercial spaces below the Vida apartment complex on Mission Street near 22nd Street as a potential location for its expansion into middle school. Alta Vista School, a nonprofit private school, will have a public pre-application meeting on April 7 to get community feedback before it applies for a change of...

There’ll be new kids on the block come August 17, when a charter school called the New School opens its doors to 44 kindergarteners and 44 first graders. The school will open its temporary 8,000 square foot space on 19th street between Alabama and Florida streets, but expects to outgrow the space as it grows over the next few years....

Tooth decay paints a bleak picture of the Mission’s growing inequality. Even as incomes rise, the kindergartners at Mission Education Center claim the dubious distinction of having the worst teeth in the city – some 75 percent have had tooth decay, according to Department of Public Health statistics. In the 94110 zip code, between 15 and 19 percent of white...

With elected officials, former and current teachers and some 265 students and many parents, Marshall Elementary celebrated its 100 anniversary Friday with singing, dancing, stories and filling a time capsule to be opened in 2115. Dulce Gutiérrez, who has a nine-year old at the school, said it was impressive to see how many people have been part of the school in different...

Linda Perez, a teacher at Buena Vista Horace Mann, shares her home with nine people — only two of them are family members. Frank Lara teaches fourth grade at the same school and has crashed on friends’ couches or shared a bedroom to make ends meet, all while struggling to repay a mountain of student loan debt. Laura Rocha, who...

Start-ups in San Francisco don’t all look the same. While many think of pink mustaches or small machines that make paying with a card easy, there is also the kind of start-up that makes it possible for an 8-year-old to explain the process of how a sundial works or examine the language of a children’s book about dragons. “I noticed...

While students at Marshall Elementary and George Moscone Elementary schools have scored well in state standardized tests, doing so has helped put them behind in acquiring technology. Better test scores meant they lost out on the $45 million, three-year federal School Improvement Grants that added computers, iPads and laptops at the Mission District’s struggling schools. But being tech deficient has...